As many of you probably know, we’ve been targeting our brewery opening for awhile now. Due to my inherent optimism, I originally thought it would be in March. Then, when I realized that the TTB (Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau) was going to take longer, I pushed it to April. Well, we did finally received our TTB approval in April — on day 94 of the 95-day clock they quoted!
I have to say, it was a bit anti-climactic. I guess the TTB (like many organizations nowadays) is understaffed, so we finally started hearing about our application on day 92, and it only took a few days after that to get the approval.
Once we received the TTB approval, we could then complete the state approval process. I spent the next couple of weeks coordinating with the state to complete an inspection of the brewery. The state showed up this past Thursday (April 28) for the inspection. Things went quite well, and I was given access to complete the second part of the state application. I completed that on Friday, drove it to Concord, and then received the verbal approval to brew some beer! Yay! Yay! Yay! 😀
The little detail now that I am working on is getting the labels approved so that we can actually sell the beer. It’s quite a process – in order to package beer for selling (either kegs or bottles), labels must be submitted and approved. First they are approved by the TTB, then those approvals get submitted with additional info to the state for their approval.
So it is now May, and we’re not quite open yet…we’re getting every bit closer, and as my optimism would have it, we will hopefully have at least some of the label approvals by the end of May, which means that we can then officially open the brewery. Finally!
Meanwhile, I am brewing to get some yummy beer ready for their labels so that we are ready to go when we get the word.
Thanks to everyone for their continued support and enthusiastic anticipation of the brewery opening. We will be planning some opening events for when the time comes. Please continue to stay tuned for those details!
